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Books : The World Is Flat [Further Updated and Expanded; Release 3.0]: A Brief History of the Twenty-first CenturyIn association with Amazon.com![: The World Is Flat [Further Updated and Expanded; Release 3.0]: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/413Jp-vLKyL._SL160_.jpg) List Price: $35.00 Amazon.com's Price: $23.10 You Save: $11.90 (34%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Binding: HardcoverDewey Decimal Number: 330.90511 EAN: 9780374292782 ISBN: 0374292787 Label: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 672 Publication Date: August 07, 2007 Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Release Date: August 07, 2007 Studio: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Sales Rank: 298929 Related Items:
Editorial Review: Product Description: The World Is Flat is Thomas L. Friedman’s account of the great changes taking place in our time, as lightning-swift advances in technology and communications put people all over the globe in touch as never before—creating an explosion of wealth in India and China, and challenging the rest of us to run even faster just to stay in place. This updated and expanded edition features more than a hundred pages of fresh reporting and commentary, drawn from Friedman’s travels around the world and across the American heartland—from anyplace where the flattening of the world is being felt. In The World Is Flat, Friedman at once shows “how and why globalization has now shifted into warp drive” (Robert Wright, Slate) and brilliantly demystifies the new flat world for readers, allowing them to make sense of the often bewildering scene unfolding before their eyes. With his inimitable ability to translate complex foreign policy and economic issues, he explains how the flattening of the world happened at the dawn of the twenty-first century; what it means to countries, companies, communities, and individuals; how governments and societies can, and must, adapt; and why terrorists want to stand in the way. More than ever, The World Is Flat is an essential update on globalization, its successes and discontents, powerfully illuminated by one of our most respected journalists. Amazon.com Review: Updated Edition: Thomas L. Friedman is not so much a futurist, which he is sometimes called, as a presentist. His aim in The World Is Flat, as in his earlier, influential Lexus and the Olive Tree, is not to give you a speculative preview of the wonders that are sure to come in your lifetime, but rather to get you caught up on the wonders that are already here. The world isn't going to be flat, it is flat, which gives Friedman's breathless narrative much of its urgency, and which also saves it from the Epcot-style polyester sheen that futurists--the optimistic ones at least--are inevitably prey to. What Friedman means by "flat" is "connected": the lowering of trade and political barriers and the exponential technical advances of the digital revolution that have made it possible to do business, or almost anything else, instantaneously with billions of other people across the planet. This in itself should not be news to anyone. But the news that Friedman has to deliver is that just when we stopped paying attention to these developments--when the dot-com bust turned interest away from the business and technology pages and when 9/11 and the Iraq War turned all eyes toward the Middle East--is when they actually began to accelerate. Globalization 3.0, as he calls it, is driven not by major corporations or giant trade organizations like the World Bank, but by individuals: desktop freelancers and innovative startups all over the world (but especially in India and China) who can compete--and win--not just for low-wage manufacturing and information labor but, increasingly, for the highest-end research and design work as well. (He doesn't forget the "mutant supply chains" like Al-Qaeda that let the small act big in more destructive ways.) Friedman has embraced this flat world in his own work, continuing to report on his story after his book's release and releasing an unprecedented hardcover update of the book a year later with 100 pages of revised and expanded material. What's changed in a year? Some of the sections that opened eyes in the first edition--on China and India, for example, and the global supply chain--are largely unaltered. Instead, Friedman has more to say about what he now calls "uploading," the direct-from-the-bottom creation of culture, knowledge, and innovation through blogging, podcasts, and open-source software. And in response to the pleas of many of his readers about how to survive the new flat world, he makes specific recommendations about the technical and creative training he thinks will be required to compete in the "New Middle" class. As before, Friedman tells his story with the catchy slogans and globe-hopping anecdotes that readers of his earlier books and his New York Times columns know well, and he holds to a stern sort of optimism. He wants to tell you how exciting this new world is, but he also wants you to know you're going to be trampled if you don't keep up with it. A year later, one can sense his rising impatience that our popular culture, and our political leaders, are not helping us keep pace. --Tom Nissley Where Were You When the World Went Flat? The Essential Tom Friedman
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 Rating: - A Book That Will Prepare You For The New WorldWhether you are a newly college grad, a cashier from Wal-Mart or you just got laid off by CitiGroup, take some time and read this book. It will give you a brand new perspective of how companies run their business today; it will probably make you realized how incompetent you actually are in a flat world. But at least you will finally be able to have a intellectual talk with your friends while you are in a bar. In "The World Is Flat", Friedman talks about how he realized that the world ... Read More Rating:  - Approachable for all readers, essential for understanding our flat world. This book should be on everyones "must read" listI found the first section (263 pages) difficult to plow through - I come from a software / engineering background and found the techie speak in the first section dry. Understandably this book was written for a broad audience, and this section was a prerequisite for the remainder of the book as it brings the reader up to speed on globalization and the events that have contributed to today's flattened world. Once through the first section the text picks up it's pace, and reads like a novel as Friedman's ... Read More Rating: - Friedman is a True Patriot!My father recommended this book to me and although it is so long that when people saw me reading it asked me if it was the Bible, it is the most important book that I've read in at least the last three years. Friedman displays unbelievable foresight, simplicity and understanding of the complex world that we live in and gives his best effort to inform anyone who is smart enough to realize how important it is to be prepared for the technological revolution that is currently underway. ... Read More Rating:  - Verbose, Monotonous, Nothing new to learn...I was very disappointed after reading this book. May be I am not the right audience for this book, I did not learn anything new from this book. Found it very boring. Rating:  - Never got the bookI thought I had bought the book but received CDs instead ... Judging by the picture I should have gotten the book... I hate the CDs !!!!! I couldn't even finish listening to the first one. Browse for similar items by category:
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Thomas L. Friedman's reporter's curiosity and his ability to recognize the patterns behind the most complex global developments have made him one of the most entertaining and authoritative sources for information about the wider world we live in, both as the foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times and as the author of landmark books like From Beirut to Jerusalem and The Lexus and the Olive Tree. They also make him an endlessly fascinating conversation partner, and we've now had the chance to talk to him about The World Is Flat twice. Read our original interview with him following the publication of the first edition of The World Is Flat to learn why there's almost no one from Washington, D.C., listed in the index of a book about the global economy, and what his one-plank platform for president would be. (Hint: his bumper stickers would say, "Can You Hear Me Now?") 
